TasWater has released its Annual Report for 2016-17, showing the strong progress the corporation is making to enhance water and sewerage services for Tasmanians.
TasWater Chairman, Miles Hampton, said in the last year the company had delivered nearly $104 million in capital improvements.
“This investment has been recognised nationally with TasWater identified as investing more per household on infrastructure than any other water utility in Australia,” Mr Hampton said.
Mr Hampton said the annual report demonstrates the kind of things TasWater does every day to ensure clean water comes out of the tap and sewage is taken care of.
“It also shows the magnitude of the job with a system that has to deal with urban and rural environments, and with assets like dams, pipes and treatment plants often located in remote or rugged terrain.
“We recognise that there is work to do, but this annual report shows we are making progress and making significant improvements across our range of operations.
“We have achieved this through careful prioritisation of projects, prudent financial management and finding more efficient ways to work.”
Mr Hampton said TasWater has financed its entire capital program while delivering the cheapest bills of any similar water and sewerage utility in Australia.
He said TasWater has identified improving drinking water quality as their customers’ first priority, and had removed 12 public health alerts since the start of the 2016-17 financial year, with the remaining alerts to be removed by 31 August 2018.
With that done, Mr Hampton said TasWater will now intensify investment on improving sewerage services from the 2017 financial year.
“By agreement with the Environment Protection Authority, we will first target 13 high capacity facilities, resulting in a significant improvement for environments and waterways which receive treated effluent.”
Mr Hampton said the $51 million upgrade of the Blackmans Bay sewage treatment plant was one of these projects with work already underway.
